Ever since the Soviet Union collapsed, there has been a surfeit of clever materials scientists without enough work to go around. Some of the more clever ones decided to take a look at what it takes to make synthetic diamond - something that has been quite aggressively unfunded (and in some cases, defunded) in the West, due to DeBeers' lock on the diamond market. About ten years ago they figured out how to make gem-quality diamond: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemesis DeBeers, of course, has a total lockdown on the international diamond market, their monopoly enforced by unfair trading practices, foment of war, etc. When Gemesis started selling diamonds, DeBeers attempted to strong-arm all of their dealers out. So Gemesis made an end-run - they now sell their diamonds to polishers, not jewelry wholesalers. DeBeers responded by etching a fucking barcode on their diamonds: http://www.debeers.com/bridal/advice/peace-of-mind So, really, the purest thing in the world - fucking molecular carbon - is suddenly trading on goddamn logo value. It didn't really work. DeBeers' stranglehold is going, going, gone, as they always knew it would the minute the cat was out of the bag (the technology the Russians came up with could have been in the west in the 60s). If it is a diamond, but only a DeBeers diamond if you unmount the stone, check it with a loupe and match the refraction pattern to a serial number on a computer in Antwerp, then you have exactly zero incentive not to pay a tenth as much for something lab-grown. In addition, lab-grown stuff is less likely to have financed civil war and slave labor in Sierra Leone. Rolexes are now on the cusp of having the same problem. I have a horologist friend; he pointed out that a lot of the Rolexes you can buy these days from Rolex - and all Omegas - use Chinese movements. Knock-off artists can buy those exact same movements and put them in "fake" rolexes. So you buy a "fake" rolex off Kow Sun Road and if you know what you're looking for, it'll likely have the exact same movement as the $20k rolex you were going to buy at Ben Bridge. I know a girl who runs two shops in Bangkok that sell knock-off clothing. Her friend owns a sweatshop that makes it. They're perfectly capable of making t-shirts every bit as good as The Gap or Banana Republic, and they speak fluent English. They can dupe American clothing 1:1 - they just don't. They learned years ago that tourists will pay more for an alligator polo shirt that says "LaCruste" than one that says "LaCoste" because tourists dig Engrish and dig having something that's obviously "fake." It's an allergic reaction to the inflation of Brand and every person experiences it. The problem above is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. The real problem these companies have is they make overpriced wares that can be perfectly duplicated by others at a fraction of the cost. When you cease innovating, the imitators catch up and you die. That's just survival of the fittest.
Is it really that there is some kind of value in knowing that someone, somewhere suffered for you to have this jewelry. Is it a symbol of master vs. slave? The bigger and more perfect the diamond, the more slaves you have kept employed? I'm not suggesting this is the only possibility, but I don't necessarily think its too far from the truth either. At least there is intellectual property associated with Gucci or Rolex. Diamonds don't even have that. If granite could be produced in a factory, would quarried granite be considered more high class as a counter top option? I doubt it, considering people like other manufactured option for home decor (e.g. Corian or quartz). But granite isn't quarried at great personal peril to those collecting it. Anyway, DeBeers are crooks and I hope one day someone robs their diamond reserves and floods the market. It would serve them right, and I wouldn't feel bad for anyone whose ring lost its value as a result.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/weddings/200... http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/e02zc/what_are_yo... http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/e02zc/what_are_yo... TL;DR: An engagement ring is a "down payment" on a marriage and, as such, is a physical object that a woman can show her friends so that they may assess the value of her marriage contract. All the bullshit about diamonds is directly related to the fact that their values have been kept artificially high by an international cartel. Culturally, there are valid reasons for some sort of "bride price" being paid... simply because of the society we live in, not through any defensible logic.
As an aside, its funny that we spent thousands of years on alchemy, albeit with gold, and now that its a reality, everyone thinks its a bad idea. Isaac Newton would love this (alchemy was one of his interests).
DeBeers should be shitting themselves. Those shameless bastards have manipulated the market for so long that they fully deserve to be undercut. But, I think if women truly didn't care, then the mark DeBeers puts on mined diamonds wouldn't work. So far, it seems to be working fine for them, as they are still in business when they really shouldn't be, given how cheaply diamonds can be made.
Cubic zirconia refract less than diamonds - so they have less "fire." Worse than that, CZ are always cut like diamond so their angles are wrong for their chemistry. Moissanite actually has a higher index of refraction than diamond, but again, you have to cut for that index of refraction. So a moissanite cut to take advantage of the fact that its a moissanite doesn't look anything like what we're used to diamonds looking like, so you have to sell it as if it's awesome all on its own. And since it's nothing but silicon carbide, any markup is a retarded markup. Synthetic diamond is its own thing. Nobody makes "fake" sapphires and rubies any more because creating synthetic corundum is child's play. It can be done in such industrial capacity that the window you pass your cans over at the checkout stand is synthetic sapphire. The gem industry makes fake topaz - which is quartz - out of real sapphire. It's cheaper than digging up topaz for class rings'n'shit. Large-scale production of gem-quality diamond will change the world much the same way large-scale production of gem-quality sapphire did. After all, the Soviets were fucking around with it in the first place because it makes a bitchin' substrate for integrated circuits.
The other day I was visiting a friend, and I noticed that his shoes were pretty cool. They were pumas, but were the kind that you design by combining a number of options. They just looked different. As production of basic material goods becomes more and more available, I have to think that brands are going to have to compete with other drivers. Instead of getting Nike's, kids might want the most tripped-out shoe design that they can download. Nike et al., have to deal with limitations of scale when they design. IMHO, that's why we've been under the thumb of 'sleek is sophisticated' for so damned long. IKEA, Pottery Barn, Banana Republic... This stuff is just beginning with the DMCA and entertainment. Blueprints will be next.
- From Mona Simpson's eulogy for Steve Jobs Gemcutting is all about math. The index of refraction of the material dictates the ideal geometry of the facet, while the cleave lines dictate the practical geometry. Any approach you take to faceting will be a curve fit between the diffraction formula, the cleave formula and the material loss formula. This is why nearly all diamonds are round, nearly all emeralds are baguette, and nearly all sapphires and rubies are deeper than similar diamonds. Every now and then someone tries to come out with another cut and hype it to the stars, but diamonds have been cut essentially the same for 90 years: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Round_brilliant I've been thinking about this and about Steve Jobs and how it relates to iPods. There have got to be a thousand different MP3 players on the market, and every major contender has a dozen knock-offs. Backintheday you couldn't really tell which ones were made by Creative and which ones were made by some factory in Shenzen that was making a container-ful to sell at flea markets. They were indistinguishable. Then the iPod came out and it was expensive, and it was feature-poor, and it sold like gangbusters. The iPod, really, was the "platonic ideal" if you will for music players. I still have a Gen1 iPod. It came out on my birthday. It took six months to change the world, but change the world it did. If you look at it now, it's still iconic-looking. The file system still makes sense. Play with a 10-year-old copy of Winamp and it's a dated, funky thing. Play with the Archos Jukebox I also had and it's somehow less modern than my 8-years-older Sony Minidisc Walkman. The iPod, on the other hand, is a product of merit... even when every aspect of the technology it uses is semi-jurassic. People still collect the original Macintoshes. Nobody collects the original PC-XT. That isn't about "brand." People don't collect Quadras. The shit Apple produced in the Sculley era is worth about as much as the shit Dell produced in the same era - f'ing nothing. It's about appreciation for a device that held iconic status. In a way, it's similar to hifi equipment; anybody who knows anything would happily pay $400 for a 10-year-old Adcom system but perish the thought of paying $300 for a brand new Kenwood or Yamaha. the Adcom was just put together in a more thoughtful fashion, with more intent and better build quality. I think companies that rely on "brand" are now, have been and always will be subject to the whims of fashion. There was a time when Members Only jackets commanded a steep price. For one exciting summer, Generra Hypercolor shirts were all the rage. And this season's Prada bag is only cool until next season, even though it costs a gajillion dollars. Compare and contrast - a decent Coach clutch will look good (and more importantly, function well) for ten years. You can't rip off Coach the way you can rip off Prada. If you want to make something that feels as nice as Coach, with the sewing quality of Coach, with the durability of Coach, you end up making something that costs near enough to Coach that it isn't marketable on the street. Meanwhile, a rip-off Coach bag costs about as much to make as a rip-off Prada bag and Prada (even if you spell it "Prado") has brand recognition. As a result, Prada has knock-off problems. Coach doesn't. One of the ways Apple has exploded as a company is by making products that are higher value without relying on the power of "brand." When Steve Jobs rejoined Apple in 1996 they had no brand - so they made ludicrous, attention-grabbing products like the Bondi Blue iMac. They were playing "me, too" in as loud and obnoxious a fashion as possible. However, as soon as they set out to define a market segment, they went conservative so fast your head spins. Most people don't realize that right around the time of the iPod, Apple went from this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Clamshell_iBook_G3.jpg to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IBook_G3_M6497_J.jpg People still buy Noguchi tables, even though their "design" is now 64 years old. You can't say that about stuff that isn't design:
I kid. I kid. OMG I forgot the clamshell. I hear you, and I agree. However, there is room for ornamentation in design. I happen to like clawfeet and gargoyles. IMHO fashion is only dumb when you pay too much. I wore things as a youth I wouldn't now, but I don't regret that I did. On a related note, my new laptop arrived yesterday, a Lenovo U260. Not bad. Even my wife who is a Mac convert was impressed. http://eeepcs.ru/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/lenovo_ideapad_u...
